


Neverland

by carpevinum



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: College Years, F/M, Friendship, Platonic Relationships, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-28
Updated: 2015-05-28
Packaged: 2018-04-01 16:57:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4027681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carpevinum/pseuds/carpevinum
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They were best friends: Brian and Lindsay, Linds and Bri. She was his Wendy and he was her Peter. She loved him — was in love with him, even if she’d never admit it — but he could never love her, just like Peter could never love Wendy, and one day she left him, just as Wendy left Peter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Neverland

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: the italicized portions are quotes from Peter Pan by JM Barrie.

Lindsay Peterson arrived at Carnegie Mellon ready to shed the vestiges of her childhood. Before she could grow up, she met Brian Kinney, a boy eager to embrace his youth for the first time since having been forced to grow up far too early.

He took her hand and taught her how to fly and together they enjoyed one final _hurrah_ before she became a real adult.

They were best friends: Brian and Lindsay, Linds and Bri. She was his Wendy and he was her Peter. She loved him — was in love with him, even if she’d never admit it — but he could never love her, just like Peter could never love Wendy, and one day she left him, just as Wendy left Peter.

 —

_It is humiliating to have to confess that this conceit of Peter was one of his most fascinating qualities. To put it with brutal frankness, there never was a cockier boy._

Lindsay first laid eyes on Brian Kinney during Art History 101 and was immediately drawn to him. Quite simply, he was the most beautiful boy she had ever seen. She briefly wondered whether she might be straight after all.

She was intrigued by him, so she followed him to the library where he worked. Lindsay sat a table behind a pile of books, never working, but watching him as he led boy after boy to the stacks and emerged fifteen minutes later, zipping up his jeans. One time, their eyes met and he merely cocked an eyebrow and smirked.

At a fraternity party, she was caught by him staring at two sorority girls drunkenly making out. Again, they locked eyes and he gave her a knowing smile. Lindsay blushed and looked away, and when she looked back, she was horrified to see him walking toward her. He gestured toward another girl and asked Lindsay why she didn’t go up to her and start making out with her.

Lindsay started to explain that she wasn’t a lesbian or anything, but Brian snorted and drank his beer. Biting her lip, she asked him how on earth she was meant to just walk up to someone and make out with them. He declared it was easy and disappeared. Within minutes, she saw him heading upstairs with one of the fraternity’s brothers.

They started hanging out together, drinking and smoking mostly. At first, they didn’t talk about anything important. She mostly just watched in awe as he fucked his way through the entire male population.

—

_“Wendy,” he continued, in a voice that no woman has ever yet been able to resist, “Wendy, one girl is more use than twenty boys.”_

Lindsay quickly learned that Brian didn’t hang out with any other people. She asked him why he didn’t have friends and he shrugged. He had one friend, Michael, and that was all. Friends were too tedious, he told her, too much work. People were only good for sex then, Lindsay retorted bitterly, and Brian agreed wholeheartedly. She crossed her arms, asking him what purpose she served in his life, considering he would never fuck her on account of them both being gay.

He didn’t respond but instead kissed her for the first time. Then they fucked for the first time, and afterwards, he declared that they were indeed friends. They would kiss and fuck many more times, in various states of drunk and high. Some nights, he would kiss her aggressively and sloppily, his tongue pressing a tiny white pill against hers. Other nights, he would kiss her more gently, often in the place of actual words.

—

_Now, if Peter had ever quite had a mother, he no longer missed her. He could do very well without one. He had thought them out, and remembered only their bad points._

Lindsay did not like to pry into Brian’s personal life, but she knew there were things he was hiding. Freshman year, she insisted his family join hers for lunch during Parents Weekend but he angrily refused. He ended up attending Sunday brunch with the Petersons, but he arrived drunk out of his mind.

Realization hit, and she found herself unable to get mad at him. How could she? His parents hadn’t bothered to visit, even though they lived just forty minutes away. Once he was sober, he admitted to her in a rare moment of vulnerability, that he had no mother, no father. They existed, yes, but he could never remember a time when they actually parented.

Lindsay listened to him, pity in her eyes, and when she opened her mouth to say something, he cut her off. He didn’t want her to cry for him or even feel sorry for him. He had given up on them long ago, and he insisted she do the same.

—

_Oh, I sha’n’t cry,” said Peter, who was already of opinion that he had never cried in his life._

One of the many things Lindsay learned was that Brian insisted that he was invincible. There were times when she had completely broken down, and he was always there to help her through. That ability of his to endure impressed Lindsay beyond words, and she found herself wishing she could live according to his mantra ‘no apologies, no regrets.’

Even when his family decided to re-enter his life, bringing an onslaught of intense religiosity and abusive alcoholism, Brian kept his calm and refused to be fazed. Lindsay always wondered if Brian was okay, because even after three years of knowing him, he could be quite unreadable. 

She thought he was going to cry at times, but he always blinked, smiled, and then resumed living his life.

—

_and so it will go on, so long as children are gay and innocent and heartless._

When graduation arrived, so did several realizations. Lindsay, a proud lesbian, finally accepted that Brian would never love her, at least not in the way she wished he would. She sadly wondered if he would ever learn love or be loved. She had expected, at the very least, that they would enter adulthood together after a four year detour. Brian would always be Peter, she thought glumly, and she tried to hold on by being Wendy for as long as she could. No, it wasn’t quite time to leave him yet, but she dread the day that would inevitably come.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not quite sure how I feel about this piece, but it's something I needed to get out of my system. Lindsay is one of my favorite characters (after Justin and Brian, of course), and I'm one of those people who tends to believe that she was more in love with Brian than she let on and may have been bisexual. Also, I recently reread Peter Pan and there are so many parallels between Brian and Peter. There are also so many differences. Long story short, I could write a thesis on Brian Kinney and Peter Pan. I love love love Brian and Lindsay's friendship, so I hope you enjoyed this, despite how hetero it may have been.


End file.
